Last week, Dr. Peter Hotez, president of Sabin Vaccine Institute and his co-author, Dr. Bruce Lee of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, published a new study in Lancet Infectious Diseases. In this first study of its kind, Drs. Hotez and Lee measured the health and economic impact of Chagas disease and found that the total economic burden matches or exceeds that of many more well-known diseases such as rotavirus, Lyme disease and cervical cancer. In total, the study estimates that the global economic cost of Chagas disease exceeds USD $7 billion annually.